A+E Interactive » Kinkyhttp://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei
Bay Area Arts and Entertainment BlogFri, 31 Jul 2015 15:11:55 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.2.3Wii gets kinky with We Darehttp://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2011/02/24/wii-gets-kinky-with-we-dare/
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2011/02/24/wii-gets-kinky-with-we-dare/#commentsThu, 24 Feb 2011 20:09:41 +0000http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/?p=20914*Update: According to Kotaku, We Dare is only going to be released in Europe, but I figure it should come over here. They built enough buzz in the past few hours to justify it. C’mon this is the company that’s… Continue Reading →

*Update: According to Kotaku, We Dare is only going to be released in Europe, but I figure it should come over here. They built enough buzz in the past few hours to justify it. C’mon this is the company that’s making a zillion dollars taking a risk on Just Dance and that paid off.

The We Dare trailer hit YouTube a few days ago, and it’s just now that we understand the full implications of it. If you haven’t seen it, check it right now. It will amaze you. It brings the idea of foreplay to a whole other level. The reaction from the Web has been amused to negative. Personally, I found it funny and brilliant. Ubisoft is going to get so much free press out of this.

]]>http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2011/02/24/wii-gets-kinky-with-we-dare/feed/13Outside Lands: Black Eyed Peas, Silversun, Pearl Jam starhttp://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2009/08/30/outside-lands-black-eyed-peas-silversun-pearl-jam-star/
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2009/08/30/outside-lands-black-eyed-peas-silversun-pearl-jam-star/#commentsSun, 30 Aug 2009 08:26:58 +0000http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2009/08/30/outside-lands-black-eyed-peas-silversun-pearl-jam-star/By Jim Harrington Second time around. Even better results. Sure, the Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival still has a way to go before it can be ranked among the country’s best large-scale music gatherings, a group that would include… Continue Reading →

Sure, the Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival still has a way to go before it can be ranked among the country’s best large-scale music gatherings, a group that would include the Monterey Jazz Festival, Southern California’s Coachella and Texas’ South by Southwest. But it’s clearly on its way.

The second annual festival, held in glorious weather conditions Friday through Sunday at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, was an improvement over last year’s inaugural Outside Lands in several ways.

The event was definitely better organized, with the promoters (Berkeley-based Another Planet Entertainment working with a pair of national presenters) having ironed out many of the issues that dogged the 2008 affair. Notably, the traffic control _ in terms of both foot traffic inside the park and the public transportation serving the event _ went smoothly. Also, the bathroom and concession lines weren’t as intimidating as last year.

Some of that can be credited to what appeared to be a smaller turn out. Organizers weren’t ready to release attendance figures by press time, but they expected 130,000 to turn out over the three days. Whatever the exact head count, the audience certainly looked smaller than last year.

Some might quibble over the headliners _ and some certainly did, championing 2008’s Radiohead and Tom Petty over anything on this year’s lineup _ but it’s hard to knock Pearl Jam and the Dave Matthews Band, which closed the shows on Friday and Saturday, respectively.

The one legitimate complaint was that fans didn’t get to see the Beasties Boys, the legendary hip-hop crew that was originally scheduled to headline Sunday’s show, but was forced to cancel the appearance after vocalist Adam Yauch was diagnosed with cancer. In the Beasties place was fill-in headliner Tenacious D, the comedic hard-rock duo featuring actor-musicians Jack Black and Kyle Gass. Now, I’m down with the D, but substituting Tenacious D for the Beasties is kind of like loaning a guy a Hyundai while his Mercedes is in the shop.

Looking beyond the headliners, however, it’s pretty clear that the overall three-day lineup _ which consisted of more than 100 bands performing on seven different stages _ was stronger than in 2008. This year’s bill included Modest Mouse, Calexico, TV on the Radio and the Silversun Pickups, all of which rank among the best live acts in the business.

It also featured notable “buzz” bands The National, Bat For Lashes, The Dead Weather, Matt & Kim and Cage the Elephant, as well as such cool wild cards as Welsh crooner Tom Jones and Mexican alt-rockers Kinky. And, perhaps most significant, the lineup was chock full of mega-popular acts that could’ve served as headliners, including Thievery Corporation, M.I.A., Jason Mraz and the Black Eyed Peas.

If you can’t have fun with that kind of all-star bill then, really, pop/rock music probably isn’t your bag.

The Black Eyed Peas, in particular, were key to this festival’s success. The L.A.-based hip-hop-pop group, featuring superstars will.i.am and Fergie, is having as good of a year as any act in the business. The Peas’ recently released fifth studio record, “The E.N.D.,” is turning out to be the album of the year (and, indeed, stands as the current frontrunner to eventually land the Grammy Award for Album of the Year).

The group’s set on Saturday, slotted in right before Dave Matthews, was a gloriously fun hour of hit singles and other unbearably catchy tunes. The Peas kicked off with the raucous “Let’s Get It Started,” an appropriate choice if there ever was one, and then just kept cranking up the intensity as they rolled through the party favorites “Pump It,” “Don’t Phunk With My Heart,” “Boom Boom Pow” and “I Gotta Feeling.”

I only saw two other acts at Outside Lands that approached the Peas’ level of greatness _ and they were both featured on Friday. The first was Silversun Pickups, the L.A. band commonly compared to prime-era Smashing Pumpkins, and the second was Pearl Jam, which used its set to race through such grungy classics as “Alive,” “Even Flow,” “Daughter” and “Animal.”

The Dave Matthews Band was good, but its offering felt like pretty standard stuff for the group. Oakland’s Raphael Saadiq also delivered a nicely soulful set early in the day on Saturday, and, unfortunately, I only caught a few moments of the Street Sweeper Social Club (featuring East Bay rapper Boots Riley) _ but what I saw was smoking.

On the other end of the scale were mundane offerings from tired alt-rockers Incubus and run-of-the-mill reggae/pop man Jason Mraz.

The great thing about this festival, however, is that when you come across a lemon you don’t have to try to make lemonade – you can just venture off to watch one of the other six stages.